Independence Day

Articles of Interest

Independence Day July 4, 1776

July 4, 1776 is celebrated as American Independence Day, but this omits a lot of the history both before and after that date. The Boston Massacre occurred in 1770. The Massachusettes colony was the fi rst to aggressively resist “taxation without representation.” After the Boston Tea Party in 1773, the British Parliament imposed the so-called Intolerable Acts in 1774, closed the Boston Harbor, revoked Massachusetts’ charter, and placed the colony under the control of the British government. The First Continental Congress was formed in early Sept. 1774 by 12 of the 13 colonies to petition King George III for peace and to protest taxation. That eventually led to the Battle of Lexington April 19, 1975. The colonies responded by establishing the Continental Army led by General George Washington. What started out as resistance became a full rebellion. All thirteen colonies attended the Second Continental Congress where the Declaration of Independence, was drafted and ratifi ed on July 4, 1776 . The American colonists were aided by France and to a lesser degree, Spain, and the war raged on until April 1782. The British government accepted American Independence with the ratifi cation of the Treaty of Paris on Sept. 3, 1783. From 1770 to 1783— it took13 long and bloody years to achieve self-rule! Why do we celebrate July 4 to mark our nation’s independence instead of say, the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783 when Great Britain fi rst recognized the colonies as a seperate nation, or Cornwallis’ surrender to General Washington in 1781? The 13 c olonies chose the day that they signed the D eclaration of Independence— the day they declared themselves “a new nation under God”—July 4, 1776. Ω